2nd gear is ******!!

BHOUST528 said:
Well i dont expect you to believe me im just letting you know what i know and have seen from experience i was a Diesel tech for 2 years...and an have been to school for auto and diesel technology...What leaving your hand on the shifter does is when in gear cruising down the road at highway speeds 55-70mph this puts a slight amount of pressure on the sliding clutchs and syncro's causing them to wear out! Like i said this may not be your guys issue but to an 18 spd tranny it is....But a tranny is a tranny no matter how many gears you have catch my drift....But with your vehicle being this new i highly doubt its from resting your arm/hand cuz these trucks that we service have more the 500,000mi on them...
That might be the case when the shifter is directly connected to the gearbox, but how can it be a problem with the 3 and its shift-by-wire system?
All that really has a chance of wearing out is the ball joint and bushings at the end of the shifting rod...
 
major error said:
That might be the case when the shifter is directly connected to the gearbox, but how can it be a problem with the 3 and its shift-by-wire system?
All that really has a chance of wearing out is the ball joint and bushings at the end of the shifting rod...

Im not that familiar with the car tranny so i dont know but the shifter does go into the tranny right? Like ive been sayin this prolly isnt the case 1.The car is so new...2.Theres no way you could wear it out that fast! Yes a trucks gear shifter does go into the top of the gearbox directly as would a car i would think? Well whatever the problem is keep us posted let us know if they take care of it and good luck. Brian
 
the service rep called me and told me everything is covered under warranty and they were pulling the tranny out today to see the problem was...he will continue to call as they progress....
 
BHOUST528 said:
Im not that familiar with the car tranny so i dont know but the shifter does go into the tranny right?
Nope. Like I said....cables do the shifting.
trans: http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123661188
shifter: http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=37055

My understanding of transmissions is pretty slim, but I'd guess that it's whatever bits that lock the gear to the output shaft that went bad. Been a long time since I've seen a tranny opened up.
Warranty FTW!
 
major error said:
Nope. Like I said....cables do the shifting.
trans: http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123661188
shifter: http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=37055

My understanding of transmissions is pretty slim, but I'd guess that it's whatever bits that lock the gear to the output shaft that went bad. Been a long time since I've seen a tranny opened up.
Warranty FTW!

o my ....i see what you are talkin about now there is alot of linkage and bushings down there so it would have to take alot of abuse to finally get to the syncros....lol hey man thanks for posting those links that clears my head up about auto trannys i know more about the big stuff since i was a diesel mech for 2 yrs...but i no long in service i am now a parts salesman but still tinker with them from time to time on the side for a lil extra $...
 
Have the MS6 trannys had any problem with popping out second gears?

I know putting your hand on the shifter can cause premature wear in some cars (although likely not cable shifted) but it should not cause a problem this soon. I have only heard about problems after 100k plus miles (specifically in Nissan SE-R models)
 
yea i duno my car only has 7700 miles on it and it started popping second gear out...i was driving in a plaza and it poped out and grinded nasty..maybe the gear wasnt in all the way or something but after that the car started occasionally spitting out the second gear...another guy on this forum had something wrong with his tranny and mazda fixed it...he has a ms6
 
so i just heard from the service guy and he told me second gear teeth were all missing or broken off... i think it may have been my fault releasing clutch and the gear wasnt all the way in and i can remember when i did that because the grind and pop out of second...well they are fixing it and everythign will be fine but if it happens again i gota pay... i guess thats not supposed to normally be warrantied but im glad i dont have to pay anything..and they are going to install my cai while the car is still in there hands...i hope this doesnt happen to third gear cuz sometimes when i mis shift 3rd it grind a lil bit...but this grind on second was loud everytime it popped out...all is well and i cant wait to get rid of this rental piece...
 
Olestra said:
Waa? Leaving your hand on the shifter shifter causing it to wear out. I dont' buy that unless you're pulling on it towards the neutral position while you drive...
It's a bad habit. It does cause a problem with some transmissions.
 
so mine was poping out of second very often during downshifts but i waited a while to complain about it and just the other day the problem escalated and now i cant use second gear under anycircumstances.. I just took my car to mazda and after some bikering and complaints from the service department (accusing me of driving to hard) they decided to replace the whole transmission since they say they have no one to repair this tranny. Luckily they didnt give me to much of a problem and gave me a mazda6 to drive for about a month due to the fact that they cant even locate one of these trannys to replace mine.
 
Do you guys rev-match? "Downshifting" without rev-matching is hard on the transmission and the synchros. Shifting hard (quickly) and shifting at high RPM are also going to wear the synchros faster.

Anyways, your problem sounds like synchros.
 
the tech at mazda was certain it was the syncro before inspecting it and informed me that the second gear synchro goes out mainly from downshifts then upshifts which confused me. I see why he would say this because during an upshift the rpms are usually at the appropiate range where during downshifts the rpms will usually be way lower than second gear will be running during a regular easy downshift without worrying about mathching rpms. The thing is though that this tranny has such a low ratio for second that i rarely ever shift into second during hard driving because 3rd pulls so good and im almost always going fast enough for that gear. The main times i ever shift down to second is during very easy city driving at low speeds and this is when i started to get the annoying popping out of second.

So answer me this, is it hard on the syncros to be shifted into second around a corner at about a speed of about 15 which is around the 2k-2.3k rpm range if i didnt rpm match the engine before letting the clutch out?
 
bustanut said:
So answer me this, is it hard on the syncros to be shifted into second around a corner at about a speed of about 15 which is around the 2k-2.3k rpm range if i didnt rpm match the engine before letting the clutch out?
FWIW, I tend to think that the definition "hard" is rather loose and most people will never worry about matching revs.

A lot of times I go by feel. The easier it is to put the shifter in gear, the better. And 99% of the time in my car improvement can be seen when revs are matched.

As far as dowshifting into 2nd like you described, it may not be the end of the world to not match revs, however, I most certainly would. It really doesn't take much. Make sure to have your foot off the clutch pedal (clutch out) and just feather the throttle a bit, then put it into gear and let the clutch out.

I'm not sure how familiar you are with this technique (double-clutching). I could try to link you to some videos if you are interested.
 
Just to be clear, if you have the clutch pushed in while matching the revs, it won't "actually" rev-match inside the transmission!
 
ok, i guess im not actually sure what rev-matching entails to be honest. So your saying to make it easiest on the synchros you have to double clutch, you cant just push in the clutch, downshift from 3rd-2nd and rev the engine to match the rpms before letting the clutch out? To be honest i dont even use that procedure but very rarely have downshifts into 2nd that exede 4k rpms which is 3k more rpms than the engine is at before letting the clutch out. How bad is this? And yes i would appreciate more information about rev-matching and how to use the tranny with the least abuse if you have any links or info
 
bustanut said:
So your saying to make it easiest on the synchros you have to double clutch
Yup. Double-clutch on downshifts.
bustanut said:
you cant just push in the clutch, downshift from 3rd-2nd and rev the engine to match the rpms before letting the clutch out?
You can, but the synchros have to do more work, so technically speaking they will sustain more wear.

On a brand new vehicle you may not notice any symptoms of wear for a long time; however, long-term this may not be good.
bustanut said:
To be honest i dont even use that procedure but very rarely have downshifts into 2nd that exede 4k rpms which is 3k more rpms than the engine is at before letting the clutch out. How bad is this?
I think it's just about the extent to which you are willing to go in order to treat your car well! Like I said, some transmissions are very robust and will do the job reliably regardless of how you treat them. The Protege transmission is crap, so I want to make it last the longest.

Also, watch any circuit race where they show the guy actually driving, you'll see that he's double-clutching on every downshift.
bustanut said:
And yes i would appreciate more information about rev-matching and how to use the tranny with the least abuse if you have any links or info
Here you go! These videos are on Google video right now. They were once on Standardshift.com, which is where I learned about them:
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=standardshift&num=10&so=0&start=0

I think some of them repeat in this Google search, but make sure to watch all of them because this is all you need to know. This guy drives fairly aggressively. You don't have to do that :D, just learn the idea. Hehe.

Double-clutching (heel-and-toe) at play (Pros Racing stock cars):
http://videos.streetfire.net/video/ba8f93f0-10cd-41ad-ac35-986e015972b1.htm
 
Also, don't worry that this seems weird for now. It will all become natural as you learn your car better.

Good luck and SORRY for the threadjack. I just felt that this was helpful. Hehe.

(encourage
 
Good info here... I haven't experienced this, but I just realized that I do a 3 to 2 downshift everytime I stop. I could see this wearing on the syncros after time...
 
Dim said:
FWIW, I tend to think that the definition "hard" is rather loose and most people will never worry about matching revs.

A lot of times I go by feel. The easier it is to put the shifter in gear, the better. And 99% of the time in my car improvement can be seen when revs are matched.

As far as dowshifting into 2nd like you described, it may not be the end of the world to not match revs, however, I most certainly would. It really doesn't take much. Make sure to have your foot off the clutch pedal (clutch out) and just feather the throttle a bit, then put it into gear and let the clutch out.

I'm not sure how familiar you are with this technique (double-clutching). I could try to link you to some videos if you are interested.

I dont double clutch, my problem with the grinding occurs from second to third in about 3500-4000 rpms, not all the time tho, very rarley.. My question is if I upgrade my tranny oil to royal purple, for example, shouldnt this "better" lubricant illiminate the problem?

Worked on my rsx typeS when I was boosting it...

Also, If I upgrade my clutch pref. Exedy stage2 if/when it comes out, and I still have a synchron problem, and the dealer sees I have an aftermarket clutch, can that void my warrenty on my trans?

They pulled that BS on my brother and he has an evo.
 

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